


All Things Must End

by tea_in_the_impala



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Ending, Future, Future Fic, Gen, Impala, Last Episode, Series Finale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-02
Updated: 2013-03-02
Packaged: 2017-12-04 01:51:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/705126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tea_in_the_impala/pseuds/tea_in_the_impala
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A short fic exploring a possible ending to Supernatural.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All Things Must End

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not really sure if I'd like Supernatural to end this way, to be honest.

The clearing was situated a little off the highway, tucked away behind clumps of trees that obstructed the relatively flat landscape. The ground was warm, heated by the afternoon sun, the tall grass that clung desperately to the dusty earth casting scar-like shadows over its surface. Occasionally, the sound of a car or truck whooshing by could be heard, none of the occupants taking notice of the distant clearing. They had no reason to either. The elongated shadows that stretched away from each of the bodies strewn across the clearing were invisible from the road. 

To one side, heaped against a tree, is an almost skeletal figure, exhaustion apparent in his hollow, sagged features. He clutches a stone tablet against his chest with crushed fingers. An older woman, whose appearance is striking in familial similarity, lies next to him. One side of her body is splayed over the other figure, a final attempt to shield him from the chaos that once took place, evident only in the occasional patch of upturned earth and flattened grass.

A little way off lays a man, a ratty cap stained in blood still jammed firmly on his disfigured head. His hand rests on an old rifle lying beside him, and tiny grains of salt are scattered around him and the gun in one last attempt to fight them off. 

In the centre there is the limp body of a man, alone, and impossibly tall, his long limbs twisted in an unnatural manner. Harsh gashes and scars sully his now lax face, and his is hair matted and clumped in a pool of coagulating blood. His face is one of boyish innocence, defiled by a destiny doomed to deny him the love and normal life he had so earnestly wished for. 

Finally, there are two figures, their limbs tangled together indiscernibly. One is wearing an ill-fitting suit and tie, and a grey trench coat that is ripped and stained, crusted with blood. His body radiates an ancient presence, tired and worn down, of being trapped in never-ending conflict. But his face is smooth - there is no regret in the man’s once brilliant blue eyes, now dulled and obscured by blood and dirt. The other figure clutches a jagged knife in one hand, other hand trapped midway in a desperate last attempt to cling to his counterpart’s arm. His shirt is scorched a charcoal black that extends over his upper body, the feather-like burns a delicate lattice that crisscross his mangled face, frozen in an expression of exhausted resignation. It is the face of a man who gave everything for his purpose, an empty shell whose last thoughts were of those who he had loved, and those who he had witnessed die. 

Dust dances in the air, glimmering and lit by the warm afternoon sun. The air is still, but for a slight breeze that sighs through the dry grass. A sigh of finality that permeated that clearing. 

A little further down the highway, a car is parked, carefully hidden amongst the forest-like gathering of trees, her sleek black frame reflecting the setting sun, tree branches casting delicate shadows over the steel. For years she will sit untouched, long after birds converge on the lifeless figures of her companions, long after a passer-by finally discovers the decomposed figures, long after their deaths are catalogued by authorities, unknowing of their value and their debt to those nameless figures. 

Of course over time she rusts, black paint flaking off, grass growing up around her, and plants warping and crushing the steel. With no one to devote their attention to her, she becomes nondescript, an abandoned machine amongst the wilderness. The leather seats mold, and the initials carved into the door wear away, until they are discernable only to those who placed them there. The little green army man wedged in the door has been chewed by an animal that made their home in the backseat amongst the waterlogged pages of a leather-bound journal and the empty wrappers of a last, cheap meal. 

For years she will remain there, the only reminder of the great service that those who called her home gave to the world.

And it is decades later when a housing development is erected nearby, and two boys stumble upon the car. The younger boy is perhaps four, and hangs back, clutching a raggedy teddy bear, while the older boy, a few years older, runs up to the rusted shell, his eyes gleaming with wonder. The elder clambers into the driver’s seat of the car, calling out to the other. The other boy sits next to him, his light hair flopping over his eyes as he rummages through a box of cassette tapes found in the glove box. The tapes are destroyed, their spools unwound and tangled together, the plastic cracked and dented, and the names handwritten in a careful scrawl on each barely visible. 

It is in that car that the two boys will play for many years, in which they will scratch their arms on the rusted shell, in which they will pretend they are vigilante crime stoppers traversing the country, and once, in which they will sit on the hood and watch the night sky. 

It is in that car that they will find happiness and comfort. And it is because of that car, and her long-forgotten companions, that they may find it at all.


End file.
